


Show Me Your Regrets

by AshToSilver



Series: A Matter of Inheritance [1]
Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Non-Linear Narrative, Orphans, Other, Revenge, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-23
Updated: 2017-01-23
Packaged: 2018-09-19 09:10:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9432053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AshToSilver/pseuds/AshToSilver
Summary: This is not the Bruce that Dick has been living with. This is not the Bruce that smiles at cameras and asks Dick very carefully every morning how he slept. This is therealBruce, the one Dick has been looking for but hasn’t been able to find until now. The real Bruce who looks like he was built to be feared.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all. Sorry I took a break to work on my original novel (which I still am). Have a one-shot from an on-going batfam idea that's spiralling out of control because my OCs won't shut up. I have another one I'm hoping to post in the next few days. The batjokes is coming soon.

“I’m going to kill him,” Bruce decides, “the man who killed my parents. When I find him, I’m going to kill him.”

“Your father would not want you to,” says Alfred, who is older, wiser, who grew up with Thomas Wayne, who buried his brother-who-was-not last month, who thinks he is pleading, begging and _losing_ , “he would say that all men deserve compassion, even killers. He would not _want you to_.”

“Mother would,” Bruce replies, like it’s easy, like it’s meant to be. “She’d have done it herself, if it had been me instead of her.”

“But it wasn’t,” says Alfred, like it _matters_.

And perhaps it does. But Bruce Wayne is twelve years old and still washing blood nobody else can see off his hands every night and so he says, “when I find that man, I’ll kill him.”

* * *

There is much that can be said of inheritance, of the things we are given from others. There is much that can be said of _genetics_ and _baggage_ and the little things that creep to the front of our minds in the middle of the night. There is much that can be said of the things we take with us always.

But Bruce says none of these things. Not because he doesn’t believe them, but because he believes he deserves them and all the pain they bring him.

* * *

When Dick Grayson is twelve years old, he crawls onto Bruce Wayne’s bed.

He doesn’t know Bruce well, but he’s been here a month or two now, so he thinks he can stop treating Bruce with kid gloves. Bruce can probably handle it. He usually looks like he could use a hug anyway.

Bruce doesn’t stir like Dick’s parents used to ( _used to, used to, used to_ ), all sleepy and tired from a long day of work and knowing their son likes to be near. Bruce is sleeping and when Dick gets to the edge of the bed, he is awake, with seemingly nothing in between. Like he had known Dick would be there. Like he was _waiting_.

And the thing is- the thing is, if Dick was anyone else (and sometimes he wishes he was but that’s neither here or now) he might have made his excuses. He might have turned around and left. He might have _asked_. But Dick is young. Dick is smart. Dick has seen his parents laid out on autopsy tables. Dick knows there is something a little wrong inside of him, in the way some people are and so Dick doesn’t know fear. He has never known fear.

He really, really should start though, because Bruce Wayne looks like the sort of person who is suppose to be terrifying. It’s the first time Dick has seen him in anything less than full sleeves and even though Bruce is still wearing a t-shirt, Dick can see how heavy, fat-covered muscle usually hidden under jackets and sweater goes taunt. A thin beam of moonlight crawls across bare skin to reveal scars that don’t look anything like accidents and when Dick finally looks up, Bruce’s face is twisted in an unusually deep, very _real_ frown.

This is not the Bruce that Dick has been living with. This is not the Bruce that smiles at cameras and asks Dick very carefully every morning how he slept. This is the _real_ Bruce, the one Dick has been looking for but hasn’t been able to find until now. The real Bruce who looks like he was built to be feared and yet Dick doesn’t _ask_.

He just crawls on top of the covers and presses his face to Bruce’s chest and hopes that if he stays there long enough, Bruce might hug him. He doesn’t have to wait long fortunately, though Bruce moves like he isn’t sure he’s doing this right at all.

“When I find-” Dick stops, the words choking in his throat with a deep sadness. “When I find who cut my parents’ rope, I’m going to kill them.”

Dick can hear the way Bruce’s breathing stops, hitching in a way that sounds painful.

“I’m going to kill them,” he says to Bruce’s heart beating rapid-fire against Dick’s ear. “I-I am going to kill them.”

Bruce says nothing for a long moment, a moment that feels like the second longest moment in Dick’s whole life. And at last he asks in a voice that is hoarse and almost _trembling_ , so softly Dick almost doesn’t hear, “would your parents want you to do that?”

There are many answers to that question, good, long answer and yet all Dick says is, “no,” because there’s something a little wrong inside of him, “no, they wouldn’t.”

The breath Bruce draws in is long and shuddering and it cracks when Dick whispers, “but I do,” with a voice that has never known fear.

There is much that can be said about the things we are given by others. But Dick, who learned how to fearless from people who thought they could fly, who mourns like Bruce did a decade ago, who is young and brave and kind and wonders what it would be like to kill, knows none of these things yet and Bruce does not tell him.

We could say that is a kindness.

But the less said of lies the better.

**Author's Note:**

> pst there is a batjokes discord channel now. It's like a server full of chatrooms related to batman and joker stuff. and memes. so many memes and headcanons and art pieces and word wars and if you would like to check it out or join us, you can contact [J-not-Joker-not-Jack-just-J](http://j-not-joker-not-jack-just-j.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr for the invite link. Discord works anonymously or with an account and can be run in a browser or on a computer or mobile app. No voice chat require. Hope to see you there!


End file.
